The Iron Ghost (21 page)

Siano crouched just under the trees, where the grass was damp and the air was heavy with the scent of pine needles. In front of her the pool that sheltered the tomb of Joah Demonsworn was utterly still, a silver mirror to the overcast sky, and the vials of blood sat in a bag next to her. It was unnaturally silent in this place – no birds sang, and even the wind was quiet. It was unnerving, but she had been waiting for some hours now, and was prepared to wait for hours more; unsurprisingly, patience was the first lesson of the House of Patience.

Eventually though, she heard light footsteps approaching through the trees. She retreated back into the shadows, although judging from the weight of the step, this was just a child. She felt a flicker of annoyance at this further distraction, then swallowed it down.

A girl walked into the clearing. She looked no more than twelve or thirteen years old, tall for her age and yet to grow out of her awkwardness. For a moment she just stood, looking at the water, and then she turned towards the trees and looked straight at Siano.

She stumbled backwards, pressing herself up against the tree trunk. She was certain the girl couldn’t have seen her, yet it was as if she hadn’t needed to search; she’d
known
where to find her.

‘Come on out, Siano,’ she said, not raising her voice. ‘I still have some work for you to do.’

Siano froze. Her first instinct was to pluck a throwing dagger from her chest belt, but her curiosity stopped her. Instead she came out from between the trees, moving slowly.

‘Who are you?’

The girl grinned at her, and even Siano, who had long since cast off anything that might have been considered warm or human, felt a real moment of crawling terror. Her smile was madness and fever.

‘Are you saying you don’t know me, Siano? Because I think you do.’

‘You are . . . the client.’

‘I speak through a severed head, a dead rabbit, a girl child. What difference does it make?’ Her voice changed then, became cultured and sly and old. ‘Does this help convince you?’

Siano swallowed hard. ‘Forgive me my caution, master.’

‘Do you have the blood?’

Siano retrieved the bag containing the vials and held them out to the girl, but she shook her head. Instead, she pointed to the pool.

‘Do you see the tomb, Siano? The history books say that the mages, in their sorrow, built a tomb for Joah Demonsworn and covered it in protective spells. It’s interesting what you can make people believe when you are old enough to tamper with the histories while they are being written. It was I who honoured Joah, who gave him the burial he deserved, and these are my spells – cast to protect his bones, so that the end might not truly be the end. Now, the blood you’ve collected for me contains another spell.’ She grinned up at Siano. ‘Can you guess what it does?’ Turning away, she plucked up a rock from the ground, and threw it into the pool. Immediately the water churned as if it were boiling. ‘You will have to go down into the water and retrieve his body, Siano.’

‘I will never make it. It will take my skin off before I get halfway there, master.’

‘I want you to drink half the blood in those vials. Half from each vial, and mind that you don’t drink more than that. If you do, I will pull your entrails out through your throat. Do you understand me?’ The girl turned to Siano, and her eyes were full of blood, from lid to lid. ‘This magic, this spell that has been hidden in generation after generation, I only have one chance to use it. If you cause it to fail in some way, you will wish your parents had killed you as they originally planned to, Siano. Drink the blood, and you will pass safely through the water.’

Siano did as she was bid, grimacing slightly at the thick, metallic taste of the partially congealed blood.

‘Good,’ the girl said when she’d finished. ‘Now get in the water. You will have to open the coffin while you are down there and bring his body out. The sarcophagus will be far too heavy to move by itself.’

Gingerly Siano stepped into the water, but it remained calm, and she shivered a little as it quickly soaked into her velvet trousers and tunic. She walked in until the water came up to her chest, and then she took a deep breath and pushed herself fully under. Siano didn’t particularly enjoy swimming – for one thing, the water that filled her ears and pushed at her eyes dulled her senses, always a dangerous state for an assassin – but she had been trained to proficiency at the House of Patience. The pool wasn’t especially deep, and in a short time she had her fingers wrapped around the coffin lid, her feet braced against the rocky bottom. This close she could see the intricacy of the runes and sigils etched into the lid with silver, and the snarling dog face loomed at her, jagged teeth bared. It made her distinctly uncomfortable to be that close to it.

The coffin lid was tremendously heavy, but with an enormous shove she pushed it away and it sank to the ground, throwing up a gritty cloud of sediment. When it was clear, Siano was greeted with the unpleasant sight of a grinning corpse; she had a brief impression of yellowed teeth, greenish strips of flesh sprouting like tufts of grass, and then her chest was burning with the need to breathe again, so she bit down her revulsion and pulled the figure from the coffin and swam for the surface, the corpse slung over her back.

The child was waiting for her on the bank. She watched as Siano dragged the rotten skeleton out onto the grass, her eyes bright with some emotion she couldn’t place. Siano stood up, soaking wet and already starting to shiver.

‘He’s looking about as well as can be expected, I suppose,’ the girl said.

Siano glanced down at the corpse. It was little more than a yellowed skeleton now, furred here and there with mouldy tatters of flesh. It had been dressed in fine robes when it had been buried, but these were now brownish rags, streaked with bright gold thread. She wondered how long the body had been in the pool.

The wind picked up then, cutting through Siano like a knife. For the first time, she began to wonder when this job would ever be over.

‘Will there be anything else?’ She forced the words out through icy lips.

The girl turned her blood-filled gaze on her, incredulous.

‘Well, he’s not going to drink the blood himself, is he?’

Siano nodded shortly. She collected the vials, all still half full, and knelt next to the skeleton, cradling its skull in her lap. Getting its jaws open was no easy task, and for one, uncertain moment, Siano thought she had pushed a finger through the spongy bone, but it was only a piece of rotten flesh. One by one she poured the contents of the vials between its teeth, until there was just the final vial to go. She glanced up at the girl, who was watching her fiercely, her small hands curled into tight fists.

‘Yes, do it,’ she said, in her strangely old voice. ‘It’s time Ede saw what a true mage can do, and he has waited long enough.’

The last of the blood trickled between the cadaver’s teeth. Dimly, Siano was aware that most of it was actually soaking into her trousers.

‘That’s it,’ she said, sitting back on her haunches. She cast the last vial into the grass. ‘I am uncertain what other rites you wish me to perform, but I feel I must state that my contract is for lives taken, and I’m not sure this constitutes—’

The skeleton suddenly convulsed in her lap, the blood-streaked jaws clapping open and shut.

‘What . . .?’

The skeleton’s hand, thin bones and rotten flesh, snaked up and grabbed Siano around the wrist, so tightly she cried out – that grip was strong enough to break her arm. She went to stand up, to attempt to shake the thing off her, but the other arm looped up around her neck, pulling her back down like an over-amorous lover wanting one more kiss. Those bony jaws clapped shut again, and this time they caught at Siano’s cheek, tearing a lump of flesh from her face. Blood spattered like rain over the skull’s forehead.

‘I am sorry, Siano.’ She could just about hear the girl’s voice over her own screaming. ‘It pains me to lose you, it really does.’

The skull lunged again, hungrily now, like a dog who’s discovered that this old sack contains something tasty after all, and although Siano pushed with all her might she couldn’t break that vice grip. With a lurch of horror she realised that it was
chewing
, that the skull was chewing pieces of her
face
, and as she watched she saw that the flesh was growing back across the yellowed bone. For every piece of Siano it ate, the corpse was regaining what it had lost.

‘No,’ she gasped, ‘no no no,’ and that was when the skeleton dragged her down into a deeper embrace and bit off her tongue. Siano felt the hot gush of blood, the insistent gnawing of the skull’s teeth against her lips, and the skittering of finger bones in her hair.

‘It’ll be the eyeballs next,’ said the girl in a matter-of-fact tone. ‘He’ll want to see what he’s doing.’

Beneath her, Siano heard the skull laughing with her own tongue.

Nuava ran across the practice yard, her heart hammering in her chest. She spotted the familiar form of Bors over by the repairs pit – he was working on a werken with a cracked foot – and she gasped in sudden relief.
Everything is fine
, she told herself firmly.
You are jumping at shadows like a child.

He looked up and, seeing her, waved cheerily enough, although his face took on the familiar creases of worry as she got closer.

‘What is it, Nuava? Are you all right?’

She nodded rapidly, suddenly feeling foolish. There were a few men and women here on this overcast afternoon, repairing their werkens or just putting them through their paces. ‘Yes, I mean, no, I’m not sure. It’s just—’

Bors put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed, just as he had when she was a little girl who’d hurt herself playing on the ice. She took a deep breath. ‘A few moments ago, there was this tremor in the Edeian. I could feel it all around me, like the whole world shifted. Did you notice anything?’

Bors frowned and shook his head. ‘You know I can’t sense the Edeian as you do, Nuava. I’ve noticed nothing unusual.’ He gestured at the yard. ‘And the werkens are all functioning well. Have you felt anything like this before?’

‘No, that’s what worries me. Have you seen Tamlyn?’

‘Not since this morning.’

There was a commotion at the gate. Nuava turned to see a tall man dressed in long, old-fashioned robes walking rapidly towards them. Next to him was a young girl of about twelve or thirteen and – Nuava blinked rapidly. She knew who it was. It was the Prophet, out from behind the curtains of her bed, walking with her head uncovered and her small moon-like face turned up to the sky. She was grinning, and Nuava felt bile pushing at the back of her throat.
Something is very wrong
.

‘Who is that?’ asked Bors. He put down the chisel he’d been holding in his free hand and wiped his fingers on his jerkin. ‘Another mercenary?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t think he’s one of them. I don’t think he’s one of them at all.’

The man had shoulder-length brown hair, thick and shining with health, and a neat brown beard that framed an open, handsome face. As he drew nearer she saw that he had large brown eyes, and his brows were creased into an amiable expression of slightly bemused good cheer. He was smiling gently, looking around at everything as though he’d never seen such a place before. The robes he wore were dark green silk, and fringed with gold – very beautiful, and extremely inappropriate for the weather. Already the bottom of his robe was heavy with melted snow. There were lengths of linen tied around his hands, linen painted with intricate shapes, and that sent a cold shiver down the back of Nuava’s neck.

There’s only one mage left in the world,
she thought,
and we’ve met him. So who is this?

‘Hello,’ called Bors, already approaching the stranger. Nuava grasped at him, but he brushed her off. ‘Can I help at all?’

‘Why, yes.’ The man’s voice was warm, educated. Reassuring. His smile broadened as he reached them, and he took Bors’s hand and clasped it briefly. ‘I’ve been away for such a long time, and I’ve so much to catch up on.’

Bors smiled, the puzzlement clear on his broad features.

‘You’re from around here?’

‘Oh you could say that,’ said the man. ‘A very long time ago, of course. But you’ve been so busy! These creatures you’ve crafted with the Edeian are quite extraordinary.’

Nuava saw her brother relax slightly, and she twisted her fingers into the fabric of her coat.

‘Well, our Mistress-Crafter, Tamlyn Nox, does most of the actual crafting – she’s my aunt – but thank you. We’ve all worked very hard and I think—’

The man reached out, quite casually, and laid the tips of his fingers against Bors’s chest. Bors glanced down, confused, and then he jumped backwards a foot, arms flailing. For a few seconds Nuava couldn’t connect the sudden wet warmth on her face with the bright, arterial splash now painting the cobbles, but then her brother fell over backwards and she saw the hole in his chest.

‘Oh, so sorry about that,’ continued the man, an expression of slightly abashed chagrin on his face. ‘But it has been
ever
such a long time.’

Distantly, Nuava could hear screaming. She knew that some of it was coming from her. The man turned to the child standing beside him.

‘My first gift to you, Bezcavar. The first of many.’

They turned away then, and Nuava fell to her knees.

Tamlyn staggered in the street. The man she’d collided with turned towards her with angry words on his lips, but, seeing who it was, he swallowed them down. Instead he nodded hurriedly, backing away.

‘Many apologies, Crafter Nox.’

She frowned at him, not even seeing his face. The tremor in the Edeian was still reverberating inside her, and the chips of Heart-Stone in the palms of her hands and her ear lobes were burning and itching. In all her years of crafting the Edeian she’d never felt anything like it, and she had no idea what it meant. Moving away down the street she glanced up to the north of the settlement, to see the warning beacons still unlit. Not an attack, then, or at least not from the Narhl.